Utah Jazz dominate defending champs on new court

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Utah’s new special court design

Gage Versteeg, Sports Editor

Most people think that the Golden State Warriors are going to win the National Basketball Association (NBA) championship come June, and that is most likely the case but I don’t think anyone told the Jazz that last night. Many fans were hyped as this was the first time the Warriors had played in Utah since last season’s playoffs when the Warriors ended our season on their quest to a championship.

Utah unveiled a new jersey and court design and this was the first time they used it all season. Rather than the usually blue, green, and gold we have had for the last couple seasons this is a play on Utah’s national and state parks, which is a cool idea. It goes with the “Community” theme that Nike had in plan for these jerseys. Personally these are in my top three along with the Miami Heat, and Charlotte Hornets.

The game itself was simply put domination. The Jazz made 58.2 percent of their shots, which is amazingly good. They also made 50 percent of their threes. The Warriors made only 45.9 and, even though this a team that is known for their three point ability,  made 20 percent which is not good. Utah outscored Golden State in every quarter and scored 30 plus in every quarter but the fourth. Golden State only managed 14 points in the fourth quarter. In the end the Jazz won by 30 points 129-99. This was the Warriors second worst loss under coach Steve Kerr and easily their worst this season.

This wasn’t that out of nowhere for Utah as we have now beat four of the top five team in the league. We won at the Boston Celtics and Toronto Raptors, and beat the San Antonio Spurs at home. We also beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, who lost to the Warriors in the finals last year. The only team that we haven’t beaten that has a top five record in the NBA is the Houston Rockets. Just looking at that you would expect us to be a top team in the league but we have struggled and lost to many bad teams this year. That might be the reason we aren’t currently in the playoff picture but this game could change it as we have momentum and are currently on a three game winning streak. Maybe we can sneak into the playoffs as a seventh or eighth seed in the West but we would have to play the Warriors or Rockets, but hey look what we did to the Warriors last night anything is possibly after playing like that.